What a marae is
The word marae, in various forms, is found across Eastern Polynesia, and in a basic sense it refers to a cleared and sacred space where a community gathers, honours its ancestors and conducts important business. The details differ from place to place. In the Society Islands (including Tahiti and Raiatea) and the Cook Islands, ancient marae were built from stone and coral, and their archaeological remains are among the most visible traces of pre-European Polynesian religion. In other islands related structures had different names, including me’ae in the Marquesas and heiau in Hawaii.
This article is about the sacred and ceremonial side of the marae. It is distinct from the broader story of how people reached the islands in the first place, which belongs to Pacific settlement, and from the monumental platforms of Rapa Nui, with their ahu ceremonial platforms and statues, though the two traditions share ancestral roots.
Typical layout
Marae varied greatly in size and rank, from small family shrines to large complexes associated with paramount chiefs. In the Society Islands, a typical marae consisted of a rectangular courtyard, often paved or marked out with upright stones, with a raised stone platform known as an ahu at one end. Upright slabs, sometimes called backrests, could stand on the platform and be linked to particular chiefs or gods. Smaller platforms, altars and enclosures were sometimes added around the courtyard.
Marae were built of basalt, coral limestone and sometimes huge numbers of water-worn stones, without mortar. Some of the largest, such as the great stepped marae at Mahaiatea on Tahiti described by European visitors in the late 18th century, were pyramid-like and built in stages. That monument was later badly damaged, and descriptions of its original size come from early visitors, so figures should be treated with caution.
Chiefs, kin groups and gods
The marae was where religion and politics met. Each major kin group and chiefly line typically had its own marae, where the group’s ancestors were remembered and its gods were approached. Rank in the community was expressed through who could build a marae, how big it was and what ceremonies could take place there. Because the right to use a platform was tied to descent, a marae also served as a statement about who held authority over land and people.
Ceremonies included offerings of food, prayers, and rituals marking events such as the installation of a chief, the beginning of a war, or the health of a community. Europeans who visited in the 1700s reported that human sacrifice took place at some marae in Tahiti and neighbouring islands, particularly in connection with war and the cult of the god ’Oro. These accounts were written by outsiders with their own biases and have to be read critically, but archaeological and oral evidence suggests that such practices occurred in at least some times and places. It was one element of a larger ritual life that was mostly concerned with food, fertility, ancestors and the stability of the community.
Taputapuatea
The best-known marae in the Pacific is Taputapuatea on the island of Raiatea, in French Polynesia. It was a major religious centre of the Society Islands, associated in oral tradition with the cult of ’Oro and with gatherings that drew chiefs from many islands. Traditions about voyages leaving Taputapuatea to settle other islands, including Aotearoa New Zealand and Hawaii, are important in Polynesian accounts, and they are valued as heritage even though the archaeology cannot confirm every journey that the stories describe.
In 2017 Taputapuatea was inscribed on the UNESCO World Heritage List as a cultural landscape. The designation recognises the site’s connection to a wider network of voyaging and the ongoing importance of the place to Polynesian communities.
Marae across the Pacific
The structure of Eastern Polynesian temples is part of the evidence researchers use to understand relationships between islands. Similar layouts and shared vocabulary point to common origins, and styles of stonework change in ways that can be tracked from island group to island group. Dating is often done with radiocarbon dating of charcoal and other organic material from within the structures, which has shown that many marae were built, rebuilt and enlarged over centuries rather than raised in a single phase. In some island groups, building activity seems to have increased in the centuries just before European contact, as chiefly competition grew.
Archaeologists also use mapping and survey, including LiDAR survey in forested areas, to find marae that are hard to spot on the ground. Careful recording of this kind helps in comparing island groups, though many sites remain unrecorded.
The marae today
In Aotearoa New Zealand, the word marae has taken on a living meaning. A Maori marae is a communal meeting ground, usually with a carved meeting house and a dining hall, where a hapu or iwi (a kin group or tribe) welcomes visitors, holds funerals, celebrations and meetings, and teaches its own history and customs. These are not ancient ruins but active centres of community life. The ancestral link to the older Eastern Polynesian temples is real, but the buildings and functions have developed over centuries in their own way.
In the Society Islands and Cook Islands, many ancient marae are now treated as heritage sites, and some are being cleared, documented and in places ceremonially reused. Visitors are generally expected to follow local guidance, since the places are still regarded as sacred.